This One Time at Suit Camp

Recently though I did push through that door, a big green door in fact on the Place de la Madeline. I then walked up two flights and rang another door, all in search of what was probably the most intimidating Parisian purchase out there: the custom-tailored suit.

Paris doesn’t have a Savile Row. Its bespoke tailors operate in places you don’t really know are there, under names you’ve never seen in magazines or on the subway. It’s a world behind a door, one that’s usually reserved for people who know people who know people who once knocked and entered and lived to tell all about it. In fact, once you do cross the landing at Camps de Luca, the hardest part is over. Why? Because Camps de Luca is a lot like the Wizard of Oz in that respect. The fear and awe you have in the beginning is quickly replaced by surprise and relief at how pleasant and warm and non-threatening the wizard actually is.

And make no mistake: These guys are wizards. Camps de Luca has been making custom-tailored suits for three generations now. Started in the late 40’s by Mario de

Luca and his business partner Joseph Camps, the Parisian institution is now run by Mario’s son Marc and his son Charles. They’ve fitted three generations of Parisians looking for that "comfortably heroic" fit, meaning it has a strong chest, soft shoulders, lean waist, and commands respect whether you’re in a boardroom or a crowded brasserie.

The great thing about Marc de Luca is that he thinks of himself as a tailor first, not a designer—a sort of trusting guide rather than a holier-than-thou tastemaker. "There’s some psychology in the process," he explains. "Once the client arrives, I can kind of tell where they want go, but I want us to reach that place together."

Another defining trait of a Camps de Luca suit is the collar. It’s firm and yet easy-fitting, a trait that comes from a painstakingly long process of puncturing and stitching a normally rigid fabric into something malleable. It’s the same process one would use to make a piece of meat more tender, but still consistent.

While watching them fit a suit, I realized how precise they were too. Marc and his assistant went through the trouble of making sure the lines of a plaid jacket were in perfect unison with the lines on the arm, keeping in mind where exactly the arm rested at the side. If you’re local, that same dedication is given in three separate fittings to ensure a flawless cut. And behind the scenes, each suit is given about 70 hours of seven people’s time.

In a world where more and more things are being produced in far off lands by people working in miserable conditions for even more miserable pay, it’s refreshing to see an atelier full of happy workers. There, in the center of Paris right above the Baccarat store, various ages work together to make something of beauty, each seemingly as invested in the process as the other.

Camps de Luca may seem like a throwback to another era, yet watching Charles learn under his father, both of them dressed in Camps de Luca suits working on Camps de Luca suits, I got the impression it might be the future. Currently the house is seeing a renaissance. The majority of their clientele is under 40, and half of that clientele comes from abroad; a clientele who’s probably grown weary of suits wearing down after three months; a clientele tired of some high school kid handing them a jacket marked "M" and pointing them to some horribly lit dressing room, where they’ll inevitably try it on alone amidst the din of a blasting Rihanna...a clientele basically sick of getting what they pay for.

For once, I pushed through the door and discovered a Paris I hadn’t known before, a Paris of the past, still servicing a Paris of the present, and one ironically well-positioned for the long term. Because buying a suit at Camps de Luca, although not cheap, is an investment for the future. What else could be more modern than that?

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